For This Reason 37

[HKHaugan]

Maturity. What do you think of when asked what it means to be a mature person? What does maturity look like and how do we obtain it? The answers I get from the world around me are usually based on social observation. A mature person is a person of wisdom who doesn't get rattled in the midst of turmoil. It's a person who remains calm and unflappable even when the worst of insults are thrown his way. He is quick to listen and slow to give opinion. He is eager to learn what makes people tick and shies away from being judgmental. He leans toward choices that are moral and helpful to others. People look up to him. On the inside everyone wishes they could be like that.

But here's the reality. Mature people don't spend time consciously trying to be mature. Their focus is what they are dealing with at the moment. It's the way they are conscious of what's going on around them, steady and measured in their responses.

Of one thing we can be sure that way of maturity doesn't happen overnight. It's a learning process based on the influences mature people have on us. This is the reason we center our consciousness on the person and character of Jesus. Having a relationship with Him opens the door to someone who regards us with spiritual optimism. He believes we are capable of wisdom, His. He invests in us at our request. His offer of Himself is not an exercise in making us guilty but rather a daily experience of personal inspiration wherein love, compassion, moral challenge come in the sense of encouragement aimed directly at our heart. There is no question about our needing confrontation because of sin. But His confrontation comes with a positive purpose, our maturity. Maturity for us is becoming more like Him in the choices we make from one minute to the next. Simply put, circumstance is the opportunity to experience Him in every next moment. We don't mature by trying to be mature but by choosing to let Him work His Spirit into every next moment.

Here's how Paul describes the process, “So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ (Eph.4:10-13).”

So three things stand out in this passage. First, our relationship with Jesus, second, our being part of God's family, the Body of Christ and third, being a disciple who is helped to maturity by the gifts of the Spirit in the Body. This is how we are enabled to be a light of Christ in the world. So we pray this each day, “Lord, this moment is yours. Let me get out of your way.”

Some say that circumstance molds character. But I would go a step further. It's our reaction to circumstance that exhibits how mature we are. That which motivates our reactions is the key to maturity. For those who have accepted Jesus as the key He becomes the measure of maturity. It's not just the example of Jesus we follow, it's the person Himself through the relationship we have with Him and our being matured in the Body of Christ..

Now I know those who don't believe in Him think that because He can't be seen He is just another historical figure who was a good man who said some wonderful things and lived a unique life. But when it comes to the shape of our character we can certainly make our own choices when it comes to living responsibly. Let me pose this question before them, “If you can't see Jesus can you really 'see' anyone?” You may see their body but do you see them as they are inside? All you really have is what sounds and sights are directed from within, a within called a person with a heart, mind and spirit which are not seeable. In the Bible we have an objective account of a person who revealed Himself over a period of several thousand years. That's a heap of time. Yet we are willing to trust our limited imperfect senses to build our character without God. Where is the logic?

So what is really happening here? We are operating on something common to every person and that is faith but it is faith separated from its source. We perceive by faith and respond by faith. We believe there is a person there and we believe in our own conscious self and we trust to relate on the basis of what we believe to be the best response at the moment, all an unseen spiritual process within.

The response of the moment led by faith calls for a structure of belief we trust to govern that response so that what is perceived is not only accurate but responded to with His insight and wisdom. This is what maturing is all about. This is the process that Jesus chose to build in us humans at Creation and is the process He filled with His perfect responses in His life on earth. He revealed in Himself what God had intended in Creation and how we can be turned around from the inner blocks of sin, fear, pride and self-absorption as we follow His invisible being in us. That is where the faith with which we were born is healed, restored and elevated as the motivating force for which it was designed by God. This process is called maturation, the way we develop what was the will of God in the beginning.

What we want to develop is a mature image of God; a mature mind, a mature heart and a mature spirit.
That's what we want to talk about next.